Exercising True Faith: Divine Grants for Every Believer Part 2 - 2 Peter 1:3-4

1:28Education. Land grants, likewise, are given for the purpose of encouraging settlement in a certain area or a certain region. One of the calls of the Bible, if you could boil it down to what is man's response to everything that has been written in the Bible, I'd boil it down to this: exercise true faith. Exercise true faith in the true God and His true anointed King, Jesus Christ. That's the summation of man's response to all that has been written. Respond in faith. But faith has to be built upon something sure. Faith cannot be built upon a mere possibility, but upon something sure.

2:19Christ himself has granted his people certain guarantees, certain promises, so that we have the foundation to exercise true faith in him. Without these grants, we can't respond in faith. And we began working through these last week. Christ has given every one of his believers these grants. And my goal is for you to see these two grants and to see the one purpose for which he has given them. So that's where we start. And that's where I hope to finish this week. Two grants, one glorious purpose. Two grants, one glorious purpose. And by way of review, remember the first grant that Jesus has given every one of his followers, everyone who is in him. And if you're not in him today, you can be in him. Simply call upon his name.

3:21Grant one. Jesus Christ has granted you everything you need for life and godliness. Look at verse 3. Seeing that his divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness through the true knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and excellence. His divine power has granted. And the word for granted is a perfect tense verb, past completed action that has continuing effects. He has granted, and these effects are still felt today. He has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness. Life involves everything you need for this life and godliness here and life and godliness in the world to come, eternal life and temporal life. Godliness refers to a reverence and an obedience that comes out of that reverence. He's granted to you everything you need for life and godliness, a reverence that leads to obedience. From the heart. And the word everything is in the emphatic position. Everything he has given you. Everything for life and godliness. So any failures, any things on your part are not the result of God's limited provision. He has granted everything necessary. Even when you fall, he has granted you everything that you can rise from that fall and put on godliness. And this grant has come through the knowledge, through the true knowledge of him who called us, who called us by his own glory, that is his radiant splendor and his own excellence, that is his virtue and his goodness. There is a drawing effect. As Christ is exalted, there is a drawing effect.

5:29And so, through the true knowledge of him, you have been granted everything you need for life and godliness. That's grant number one. I want to look at the second grant that he has given, and that's in verse 4. Jesus Christ has granted you his precious and magnificent promises. Look at verse 4. For by these he has granted to us his precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption. That is in the world by lust. For by these, let's just start walking through the verse. For by these, referring back to his own glory and excellence, he has granted to us. Same verb, same perfect verb, a past action with continuous results. He has granted.

6:21And their effects continue today. Look at what he's granted. He has granted promises. Promises. A promise is an assurance of something pledged, right? A promise to a certain outcome, a commitment to a certain outcome. And what a promise implies is that the grantor is willing to make good on the pledge. Promise also implies that he was not under compulsion or an obligation to grant these. He simply grants them by his own glory and excellence. The reason he gives these promises and these grants to all of his people has nothing to do with his people, but has everything to do with him, his glory, and his excellence. But look at how his promises are described. Precious. Notice that first one? His precious promises. Word for precious means valuable. He uses it in 1 Peter 1:19 to refer to the precious blood of a spotless lamb. The preciousness, the intense value. We can think of precious in the sense of a very valuable diamond, right? Or a very valuable gem, a precious, valuable gem. That's the idea. Precious gems, valuable promises, precious promises. The second, he describes these promises as what? Magnificent, magnificent, great, huge, incredible, massive.

8:03We can think of a massive object like the Rock of Gibraltar, perhaps, one of the largest monolithic pieces of limestone in the world. It's at the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea down there off the southern coast of Spain. It shoots up about 1,400 feet, just one big piece of limestone. Or you can think of, if you guys are from anyone from California or have been to Yosemite National Park, you know there's a big mountain there called El Capitan. It's this big, large piece of granite, one big monolithic piece of granite that just shoots up 3,000 feet from the bottom of Yosemite Valley. Just a huge, massive, magnificent piece of granite. Well, when you put these together, precious and great, that's how he refers to these promises. And they're two words you usually don't put together. Precious and great, right?

9:04Think about a choice, beautiful diamond of the choicest sort. Now think of that as being the size and magnitude of El Capitan. Precious and magnificent. Huge. Words you don't usually put together. So, what are these precious and magnificent promises? Well, you know, Paul brought the gospel to these churches in Asia Minor. Everything that Paul had promised, everything in Paul's theology as he preached the gospel, everything that Peter communicated in the gospel. It's these precious and magnificent promises that come with the gospel, the good news. And they're promises for every one of his believers.

9:54We can just look at a few of them this morning. In fact, I'd like to take a few moments to look at some of these great and precious and magnificent promises that are given to you who are here in Christ today. First of all, I can, as you walk through the gospel, you realize there's this precious and perfect promise of forgiveness. Forgiveness. Just think about how precious that is. The promise of perfect pardon. Colossians 1:13 says, For he rescued us from the domain of darkness and trouble. Transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. Forgiveness. Think about how precious that is, that God, that God does not hold sins against people, that God is of a heart to let it go, let things go.

10:53He doesn't want to hold on and hold it against you. That's not in his heart. Just think how precious that is, especially in a world of unforgiveness, where people hold on, where vengeance belongs to the one wronged. I think about how precious forgiveness is. I also think about how magnificent forgiveness is when I think about the depth of my own sin that He has forgiven. When I think about the mass of humanity, the depths and the breadths of sin, and that God is able to not hold it against us, but let it go. Surely a precious and magnificent promise. And then there's that promise of righteousness, a righteousness that exceeds perfect obedience to the letter of the law, God's perfect righteousness, in which God's perfect delight resides. Romans 5:19, it says, through the obedience of the one, Christ, the many. Will be made righteous. 2 Corinthians 5.21 says, He made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him. Think about how precious that thought is. Perfect innocence based upon absolute justice.

12:21And in a world where wrong is called right and right is called wrong, there's this precious gem of true righteousness, complete rightness, with not without favoritism, a righteousness that comes out of the heart of God and he gives to his people. But it's magnificent as well, as you can think about the degree of unrighteousness in this world, the utter, profound pit of unrighteousness, and then you compare that to the utter height of righteousness that he puts in his people. Surely this is magnificent.

13:05He elevates us from the pit to the pinnacle, infinite righteousness. Then there's the promise of reconciliation. What a beautiful, precious thought this is. Colossians 1.19 says, For it was the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in him and through him to reconcile all things to himself, having made peace through the blood of his Cross, and although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet he has now reconciled you in his fleshly body through death in order to present you before him holy and blameless and beyond reproach. How precious it is that broken relationships can be reconciled, that warring parties can find peace, where hostility is replaced with joyful fellowship. Surely this is a precious promise.

14:08And it's magnificent when one thinks just how severe the hostility between righteousness and unrighteousness is. Perfect holiness set against abject sinfulness. Surely it's magnificent when you think of the animosity, and yet God brought those who were on the outside, those who were far off, he brought them near. He made peace through his blood, that you can have peace with your creator. On your side and on his side, for once you had not a taste at all for the things of God.

14:49And his wrath was upon you. Surely reconciliation is a precious and magnificent promise. But then we have the precious. And magnificent promise of adoption, adoption. Galatians 4:4 says this: But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, so that he might redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons, children now of God, children and heir to all of his riches. Surely this is a precious concept, right? A precious promise.

15:33Is not the whole concept of adoption itself a precious diamond? Once alienated, once orphaned, once on the outside, once having nothing to do with the things of God or the family of God, now possessing all the privileges and love of the most dearest child? Is that not precious? Is it not magnificent when I think about the eternal mass of love and affection and riches that this involves, moving from a state of one outside to the place of the dearest, most precious beloved son? Surely this is precious and magnificent, this promise. Well, there's forgiveness, there's righteousness, there's reconciliation, there's adoption, and there's more, much, much, much more.

16:27And the little time that I have this morning, I can barely eat. Even scratch the surface, but I want to share some more of these precious promises. Spiritual life. Romans 8:10 says, This, if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, yet the spirit is alive because of righteousness. How precious it is to a spirit that is alive to God, a spirit that has been awakened in conscience to the ways of God and sensitive to His standards of righteousness. It is a beautiful picture in our world today when you see an individual who has been awakened, who is alive in the Spirit, who has spiritual life, and how magnificent it is when I think of the deadness of this world and how hard this our universities and our world tries to impress upon you that there is no God.

17:35We work very hard to suppress the obvious, and yet within this world, spiritual life comes forth. It's a precious and magnificent thing. In fact, one of my favorite aspects of being a pastor is watching people come to Christ, watching God draw individuals to Himself and then awaken them and see that precious. New spiritual life come forth. And then there's on the heels of that comes resurrection life. Romans 8, and very next verse says this, but if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you. John 11:25, Jesus said, I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live even if he dies.

18:34Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15, 21, For since by a man death came, by man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ will be made alive. But each in his own order, Christ the first fruits, after that, those who are Christ at his coming. A promise of a literal physical resurrection, physical life in this decaying body, this aging and decaying body. Surely it's precious, but surely it's magnificent. When you look at death bats a thousand percent, right? Well, I missed one.

19:20But we await a newness. I think there are two realities in life I've always been told about. One, death, two, taxes. I've Some people try to get out of taxes, and maybe some have escaped. I haven't seen anybody get out of death save the Lord of life himself and a future promise that he is going to resurrect his people. That's a promise, a promise. And then there's the promise of the Holy Spirit. Ephesians 1:13, in him, you also, having, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, having also believed you were sealed in him with the Holy Spirit of promise. What a precious promise this is.

20:07Because I know my own proneness to wonder. I need to hear this. Right? You know, the Spirit, His Spirit, versus the Spirit of this age and corrupt world, He gives His Holy Spirit. It is because He knows I need to be sealed in Him, kept in Him, welded to Him, bonded to Him. What a precious promise for His people. And magnificent when you think of all believers, all time eternally sealed, the guarantee that all these realities are going to happen. What a precious promise. What a magnificent promise. And then there's the promise of joy. Galatians 5:22, the fruit of The Spirit is love and joy. Psalm 123:16, the Redeemed, her godly ones, are going to sing aloud for joy.

21:12They're going to be clothed with salvation and sing with joy. And how precious is genuine joy? It's beautiful, it's innocent, it's pure, and so much, so precious it is in this world of so much sadness, so much that goes on, and yet the eternal destiny of God's people is eternal joy. Joy. And we could even live that way now. Magnificent is this promise of joy when one considers the depth and despair of what living in a world that has been permeated with sin.

22:01And this joy when you think about the world that's covered with personal failures, dashed hopes, and the pain of many, many sorrows, the pain of being the victim, the guilt of being the one doing the wrong, and many other profound things that send people into deep pits of depression. Yet, here we have this magnificent promise. Of joy. That God promises his people a basis for joy, even in the midst of some of the most horrific things that the earth can throw at us. And then there's this promise of strength, promise of strength. Isaiah 40:31 says this: yet those who wait for the Lord will regain new strength. They will mount up with wings like eagles. They will run and not get tired. They will walk and not become weary.

23:03How precious is enduring strength? Overcoming all odds on the outside and overcoming all personal failures on the inside. Enduring strength is a precious thing in a world of quitters. I tell you, there is nothing more painful than watching a professing Christian fall into sin and discouragement. But he promises strength. And it's magnificent when you think about the frailty of our flesh and the overwhelming cruelty of our enemy. And the promises that not only we will stand, but that we will mount up, that we will run, that we will take territory, even in the midst of a broken, decaying, falling, and cruelly hostile world at times. And then he promises help.

24:01Isaiah 41, 10, Do not fear, for I am with you. Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God. I will strengthen you. Surely I will help you. Surely I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. I mean, how precious is that? A true helper in times of need. Now, that's precious. A true helper and magnificent. And the fact that he never turns away those who come to him for help. And his help fits us for eternity. He gives the right help, just what we need. He lives to help. What an enduring, incredible, precious, and magnificent promise. And he gives instruction, the promise of instruction. John 14, 26, but the helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you. And his instruction. It's good to have instruction in a world, good, true instruction, in a world of false and very misleading paths. But his instruction is wise. It is always wise. James 3, 17 says this, but the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy, and good fruits.

25:31You see, God always chooses the best goals and the best means to accomplish those goals for his people. His instruction is always to the best goal and the best path to get to that goal. It's always that way. Anything else would be, he would be less than God and who he claims to be. Now, sometimes we need to have a perspective to see that. But he promises to give us that instruction too. And then there's that incredible, incredible, precious, and magnificent promise of providence. Listen to what Romans 8:28 says. And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to his purposes. All things. No limitation here. What a precious promise that everything around, every event, every person, every circumstance, everything that goes on, God uses and works for my good. Wow. Now that's a precious promise. That'll add stability to the soul.

26:43And it's magnificent when I think about how many people are in this room and how many people that are in Him throughout the ages. And I think about how many circumstances and how many people and how many events and how many. Things that that represents. And he is able to magnificently control all of these and work them together for our good. That is a precious and magnificent promise. Go out and live on this, okay? And then he gives us that wonderful promise of heaven. I love this. John 14:1. Do not let your heart be troubled. Believe in God. Believe also in me. In my Father's house are many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have told you. For I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am, there you may be also. In fact, Peter is going to end this book on that note of heaven in chapter 3 and verse 13. He says, But according to his promise, we are looking for a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells, the promise of heaven. Think about how precious that is. That there is a place where sin does not come in, where death is no more, where people are perfected in love towards one another and to God, and that humanity can be all that humanity. Humanity was created to be without sin, full capacity.

28:38It's incredible. And I think about heaven in terms of not just how precious the thought, but how magnificent the thought is that the eternal God, forever taxing the infinite limits of his creative abilities to welcome, cherish, and to bless and enjoy his people eternally. That's heaven. Magnificent, precious promise. Any one of these we could just stop and go home on. Then there's the promise of abundant life. John 10:10. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it more abundantly. How precious is that Christ, very different from those who come to steal, kill, and destroy, to wear you down, to take? Here is one that comes to build, to strengthen. He is your perfect ally, one who continually is a giver.

29:44He is a continual giver to the well-being of your soul. He is not one who takes and drains, but one whose whole purpose is to come to you and to build you up. And I think about this precious promise. I think about its awesomeness, its magnificence. This is the enduring commitment eternally of Christ to His people. He is the eternal giver to all of His people continually. That is His relationship. He has come that they may have life and more abundantly.

30:23And then come back to 2 Peter. He gives you the power to live the abundant life. Verse 13. Verse 13 itself is one of the precious and magnificent promises, seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. You see, God has given us promises, not possibilities. They're not called precious and magnificent possibilities, are they? You see, faith cannot be sustained on a mere possibility, but on a promise.

31:01Exercising true faith must begin upon a solid foundation of God's promises, and he says, here they are. See, I don't want anybody here leaving today with a mere possibility of heaven or a mere possibility of good things in your future. I want you to leave here today resting in the promises of God. That is the way Christ wants you to leave here today. On his promises, that's why he gives them. There is no stability on mere possibilities.

31:40Remember a guy who was kind of down on his life? He flunked out of school, was on drugs, lost his job, didn't have much going for him. Someone asked him, well, what are you going to do? He says, dude, I bought a lottery ticket and really hoping something good comes through on that. There's not much you can really plan on that, right? Oh, God, he knows there's no rest in possibilities. In fact, there's only torture in possibilities. Oh, I wish, if only that. No, he gives them.

32:14So the question is, are you in him? If you are, these are yours. If you're not, the invitation is for you to come to him today. So the first grant, Jesus Christ has granted to you everything you need for life and godliness. Grant number two, Jesus Christ has granted you his precious and magnificent promises. Now I want you to see one glorious purpose why he does so. Look back at verse 4. For by these he has granted to us his precious and magnificent promises. So that. See that? Underline that. So that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust. So that. You say that? So that by these, by these, his precious and magnificent promises, which includes verse 3. And everything we've mentioned, everything Paul would have brought, everything that Peter would have brought in the gospel, all the promises, so that by them you may become partakers. That is, a fellowshipper, a partaker. It's the word koinonia, a sharer, one who partakes in of, look back, the divine nature, that you may be a partaker of God's own nature. Now, I don't want anybody to be confused about this. We are not like God in his godness. We will never partake of what theologians call his incommunicable attributes, that is, like his omniscience. He knows all things. You're not going to partake of him in the sense that you're going to become God himself, that you're going to be all-powerful or all-knowing or all-present. No, there's always going to be that distinction between he is the creator, we are the creature.

33:58But there is a new birth, a new creature that is of according to the nature of God. 2 Corinthians 5:17. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature. The old things have passed away. Behold, new things have come. A new nature has come. And he gives us these promises so that we may partake of his moral and spiritual excellence. He wants us to be morally and spiritually like himself in that sense, a real sense. We partake of God's nature. He is a forgiving God. We looked at the promises. He forgives. Guess what? We can also be a forgiving people. How beautiful and precious that is. Righteousness He gives, that we might be just and right and true without favoritism. He is a reconciling God. We can too be morally and spiritually like Him and seek reconciliation. He is a God who adopts, He is a God who is good, He is a God who gives, He is a God who strengthens, He is a God who helps, He is a God who serves, He is a God who loves. All that we may take of that spiritual and moral perfection and grow in this. Even now, one day we will ultimately be that in its completed sense. But now, as we live here, we see these and we are to grow in these. We are to live in the reality that this is what He has given. Look back. Life is growth, growth on into eternity. And life is eternal because He is eternal. But death, on the contrary, it's decline. Death is decline. Look at verse 4. Having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust. Corruption. What is corruption? It's the process of decay, the process of deteriorating, the process of destruction. Remember, I was up in northern New Mexico. We were up in Santa Fe one time, and I brought my RV up there. And I know the Johnsons, music minister, the Gentries, our deacon of finance, there. We were spending some time up there. And one time we were driving down the road, and all of a sudden, this big hunk of metal just fell out underneath my RV. I don't know if you guys remember that, but we had to jump out in the road, and I looked up underneath that. that RV and there was this big, big, wide hunk of metal that just fell down. And I don't know, I looked up there and all of a sudden I saw all this corrosion and corruption. You see, for years, we had been going up to the north to Montana, Minnesota, and they salt the roads up there. And so the salt gets up underneath there, and over time, it deteriorates, it corrodes, it corrupts, until finally a big hunk of metal can just fall off. It looks all good from the outside. By the way, I've got an RV for sale. It's got low miles on it, so just see me afterwards. But if you look up underneath it, there's a lot of corrosion. Well, that's what corrosion does. And look at back at verse 4. Peter speaks of a corruption that is in the world by lust. And the lust is the defiling passions, the corrupt desires. He will use that in chapter 2 and verse 10 to speak about the corrupt desires of those who despise authority and those who indulge the flesh. James speaks of it when he says in James 1.15, when lust has conceived, it's something that's in the heart, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death, complete destruction. And Peter is of the same mind. Very much, this whole book, he's warning against the corruption of the flesh. In fact, 1 Peter 1:14, Peter says this, As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance. In 1 Peter 2.11, he says this, Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts, which wage war against the soul. We talked about what deteriorates? It's lust. In 1 Peter 4, 3, he says, Look, for the time is already past and sufficient for you have carried out the desires of the Gentiles, having pursued a course of sensuality and lust and drunkenness and carousing, etc.

38:25And this is the characteristic when he comes into 2 Peter that he talks about the false teachers. 2 Peter 2.18, he says this, For speaking out arrogant words of vanity, they entice by fleshly desires, by sensuality, those who barely escape from the ones who live in error, promising them freedom while they themselves are slaves of corruption. For by what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved. And he's saying, beware of them. You're going to know who these false teachers are because of their sensual corruption. Corrupt desires. In fact, chapter 3 and verse 3 says, Know this, first of all, that in the last days, mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts. You see, you get the sense, 1 and 2 Peter are really books for our time. 1 Peter, he's very concerned about the persecution that's coming against the church. And in 2 Peter, he's really concerned about the false teachers that are coming into the church. So Peter is warning. You want to know what's wrong with the world? It's the lust of mankind. You know what's causing the decay, societal deterioration?

39:42It's a philosophy of satisfying fleshly indulgences. And that comes from the outside. And what Peter is concerned about is that there were those in the church that were starting to synchronize what biblical theology and what the apostolic preachers had communicated, and they were mixing it with a carnal, fleshly lifestyle. You see, corruption is the beginning of destruction. Destruction is complete corruption. So don't think that philosophies or laws that give more license to corrupt desires are going to improve this world because they're not.

40:24See, Adam and Eve's sin seemed harmless enough, right? I'll take that. I'll do that. Seems right to me, feels good, tastes good, I'll do that. It set humanity upon a very deadly course. We don't have to imagine anymore what a world is like where everybody lives according to their own competing fleshly desires. But what God wants is that humanity needs a line. They need Him, in union with Him, to do the things that please Him. So, what Peter is teaching us is: either a person is a partaker of the corruption that is in the world by lust, or a partaker of the divine nature. You're a partaker of one or the other. You will escape the corruption of the world by lust, or you are going to be destroyed by it. That's Peter's message. Where are you?

41:19Peter's concern for you individually, it's Peter's concern for you as the church. You're either going to partake of the divine nature or you are going to partake of the corrupt nature. Well, grants are given to encourage an outcome, right? Education grants are given to encourage education. Land grants are given to encourage settlement. Jesus gave you the grant. He's given you everything you need for a life of godliness. Number two, he's given you everything. He's granted you his precious and magnificent promises with one glorious purpose in mind, so that by them. You may become partakers of the divine nature. He gives you all this. He gives you these grants so that you will exercise faith in him today.

42:13How do you exercise faith in him? You believe his promises and you go out of here living as if these promises are certain. That's faith. That's faith. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your magnificent, precious promises. We thank you, Lord, for giving us these words in this hour, Father, when we know that there is a great societal push and even within many of the professing church, Father, to compromise your truth, your righteousness, your standards, your words for the sake of indulging the flesh and adopting philosophies and theologies that would get us there. And, Father, I just pray now that you would convict us deeply of our own sin, of our own folly. Father, that you would stir in us and give us a hunger and a thirst and a faith and a trust in your precious promises. Father, that your people would be clothed with joy and splendor.

43:31Characterized by faith, soaring in our times. Father, we thank you for these. Strengthen us. In Jesus' name, amen.